Jack Loftus

Chess World Champion Vladimir Kramnik laughs it up in this video of his match against a merciless robot arm, but on the inside, like the rest of humanity, you can see the growing sense of dread. We are doomed.

Called the Chess Terminator, this little guy was actually revealed last June. This particular match, however, is the first time it's played a quick "blitz" game with a human opponent. In its current configuration ol' C.T. could theoretically play chess for 24 hours straight before needing a recharge.

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Robot-human chess battles are nothing new of course. Big Blue defeated Garry Kasparov way back in 1997. That said, this is the first time I've seen where the robot/computerized opponent could actually reach across the table and beat its human opponent to death if it wanted to. And believe me, it wanted to. [Chess In Translation via Gizmag via Engadget]